Ramblings on what led me to The Compact pt. 2

This cute little stuffed animal with Mary was what finally pushed me over the edge. For those of you without a 10 year old child, let me introduce you to a Webkinz. They are little stuffed animals that come with tags allowing you to register it on the computer at Webkinz world, where you can play games to earn webkinz bucks to feed your pets, clothe them, house them, etc. Mary currently has in excess of 25 Webkinz. At our house. She has more at her father's and at her grandma's. She regularly asks for a new Webkinz. This is her official last webkinz that she received on Easter morning. The first thing she wanted to do upon receiving "Ellen" was to register her on Webkinz world. Which I allowed her to do. I asked if I could see some of the rooms she had set up for her animals and started scrolling through her Webkinz account. It was then that I saw the page after page of registered Webkinz that she actually had. And the Webkinz people so kindly post next to each pet what was the last date they were actually "played" with online. Page after page of "December 2008", "November 2008", "July 2008", "April 2008"....it went on and on. Apparently once Mary receives a Webkinz, she plays with it online, then moves on to wanting a new one. Once she has it, it's no longer fun and she "needs" another one. Page after page of pets online that were bought because she had to have it that haven't been played with in months, in some cases in a year or more. Now let me back up a bit to last Friday. Mary had off of school and we decided to go shopping with Grandma. I spent a lot of money, mainly on Mary. I knew she needed new clothes for summer. We went to Abercrombie where she proceeded to pick out a new summer wardrobe. Yesterday, I walked into her bedroom and the clothes are still sat. In the bag. Untouched. There are a pile of books on her bedside table. Books she had to have....unread. Our basement is literally loaded with toys and games that have rarely, if ever, been played with. I packed up a bag of clothing to be donated to charity last week. Many of the clothes had tags still on them. The family got a Wii and Wii Fit for Christmas. Wii Fit has been played with maybe three times since December. Between Russ and Mary, the Wii gets played with maybe one time per week. My husband bought me an iPod Touch for Christmas. I used it a lot at first, but have barely touched it in at least 2 months. My two year old plays games on it. WHAT?! That cost well over $200. What are we doing? What are we thinking? We think we are doing well because we have some savings and no debt. But what are we teaching our kids? We don't value the things we have because we have too much. Want something? Just go get it. It's time to use up, wear out, make do, or do without. It's time to spend more time as a family DOING and less time buying.

Ramblings on what led me to The Compact Pt. 1

In September 2006 our daughter Alice was born. The one thing my husband really wanted was for her to be christened in England, and to have a party for his family to introduce his new daughter. Since we had just done a huge move less than a year earlier (moving from the UK to the US), incurring a lot of legal bills and immigration bills, as well as having a new baby the money for a big trip was not there. In December 2006, exactly 12 weeks after I gave birth to Alice, I went back to work. By July 2006 we had saved over $12,000 and had paid cash for a first class trip to the UK, including the christening party for the baby. No expense was spared and we shopped til we dropped across England. We had a great time but the biggest lesson we learned was we could live off of ONE salary and use the second salary for things we liked, such as travel. In January 2008 my husband got a fantastic new job that paid more than what the two of us had been making together. We made the decision for me to stay home. During 2008 we bought a new house and moved to the area we wanted to live in- an area we were convinced we couldn't afford- and took another trip to England to see my husband's family and attend his best friends wedding. Life was good. We bought what we wanted, travelled when we wanted, and all on one salary. Though we weren't necessarily frugal (our food budget alone was close to $300 per week), we are both naturally quite frugal and we drive used cars and don't use credit cards. Then the bubble burst. In November 2008 my husband's company missed a pay day. He was paid 3 days later, but it was still worrying. There were several people Russ worked with who lived pay check to pay check who weren't able to buy FOOD for those 3 days. That scared me. While we weren't at that point, we definitely didn't have the suggested 6 months worth of savings in an emergency fund. We didn't have 3 months worth of savings. We started discussing me getting a job. We decided to pay off the small credit card balance we had and cut up the credit cards. In February 2009 my husband was sent home from work. The company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. To this day my husband has not been paid for the last 40 hours shift that he worked. Because of forward thinking, our family did not fall apart. We have no debt other than our mortgage. At about the same time we refinanced our mortgage and shaved 1% point off of the balance of our mortgage, saving over $100 a month. Shortly after Christmas, with lots of rumors swirling around about the company, my husband contacted his old place of employment and negotiated a part time position. He worked full time at one job, and part time at another. The day after his job sent everyone home, he started full time at his old place of employment. Forward thinking saved us. However, my husband's salary has now been cut in half, with a much higher insurance premium. At this point I kept saying I should go back to work. Russ was pretty adament he wanted me to stay home to maintain consistency to our children and to provide as good of a homelife as we could. So my mission in life was to provide a happy, healthy home while trying to save as much money as possible. It doesn't seem like a hard ship, it feels natural. Currently we have no debt other than our mortgage (we have one credit card without a balance hidden in a drawer "just in case"). We pay cash for everything. I feel proud of my husband and myself for doing so well financially. Sometimes I almost feel like it's bragging but then I laugh. In this consumer society, don't most people brag about what they HAVE, not what they don't have?!

Basic introductory thoughts

This blog is an attempt to discuss my thoughts on The Compact as well as to discuss other areas of interest such as books and travel. I am a stay at home mom who does not like the consumerist culture I currently live in. Recently, on Facebook, I read an old high school "friend's" page about themself and their goal in life was to make as much money as they could. I found myself pretty shocked to see that proudly displayed as someone's life's goal. Not make the world a better place, not to see the beauty in their daily world, not to help others but to amass as much money as possible. I suppose I shouldn't be shocked. Everyone else has their own concept of what in life would make them happy. For that person, the accumulation of wealth is their idea of success. I would have liked to see them expand on the idea- what would they do with their money? What do they choose to do now with their money? What is it about money that makes them happy? But to be frank it turned me off so much that I deleted them as a friend. I never really liked her much anyway. (joke) My desire to do The Compact as a goal for myself and my family is a long time in coming. Let me say I have always been a frugal person, however like most people living in the US today, I have fallen into the trap of material possessions, using shopping as a family activity, buying to please people: myself, my children, my husband, etc. It's never felt normal or good to me though. In fact, more often than not after a day of shopping I am so anxious I return most of what I bought anyway. I have toyed with frugal living off and on for at least 15 years. I always have good intentions, then they fall by the wayside as real life takes over. However this time I am determined to make a real lifestyle change. Several things have occurred in the last year or so to make me absolutely resolute to change our lives. In the next post I'll discuss what, why, and how we will make the change to living a more satisfying, frugal, less consumerist life.